How we got to reusable rockets

Let's start in 1969 - the Apollo program has succeeded in its goal, landing humans on the moon and returning them to Earth. There are a few estimates of the cost of the Apollo program, which began before 1969 and continued after, most hover around 120 billion (2010) dollars. 13 flights, almost ten billion per flight; Richard Nixon reasonably desired to

Skylab was envisioned as one use of the remaining Saturn rockets

The actual space station turned out to be mostly a success after a few

Here was another Apollo Applications Program - an Apollo capsule and a Soyuz capsule docked in space to demonstrate a rescue ability. Possibly the greatest success of the space program is of course the slightly trippy art.

Another option was a moon base, this image comes from a design process from the 1980s, note the cute robot at the from of the rover - the 1970s design would have landed a command module, the three person capsule of the Apollo project. Astronauts could have stayed for

NASA envisioned this absolutely terrifying system for getting around the surface. Why not go with jet packs NASA?

You can see one of the space capsules in Winslow, Arizona - they aren't that big and I wouldn't want to spend 200 days in one.

Here we can see Wernher Von Braun's 1950s Mars plan - note the rockets sitting on their tails; this was a very 1950s way of envisioning reusable rockets.

Here is a conception of what a post-apollo Mars project might have looked like. This would have required a rocket larger than the Saturn V.

Here is a bonus photo of Buzz Aldrin in front of a photo of Buzz Aldrin in front of Stonehenge. We know how Buzz voted on the future of Apollo #getyourasstomars